My Popover Sundress Remix: The Reversible Bubble

This week marks the beginning of a fun sewing-for-kids contest known as Project Run & Play.  I've been an observer in the past, and then when the creators added a contest for women's clothing (Project Sewn), I joined the reader sewalongs, and had a great time posting my looks for the challenges and seeing other sewist's take on the same theme.  So when Project Run & Play got going this time around (you can see my dress linked up at the bottom of that link, by the way), I thought I'd give the sewalong a try!  The first week's theme is always doing a new take on a great existing pattern, and this year's pattern remix is the sweet Oliver + S free pattern The Popover Sundress.

I'd had this pattern pinned for a while since I can't resist a freebie.  But when I decided to take on the challenge I struggled.  One of the great things about this pattern to me IS it's simplicity, and a lot of the ideas I tossed around for remixing it just felt overworked to me.  I thought I might have something to upcycle that would inspire me to change up the pattern, and when I started digging around I found this skirt:

Pardon the wrinkly linen.

With this cool embroidered panel detail:

It would totally work perfectly for the Popover Sundress pattern, and give the dress lots of cool details with minimal effort from me.  Problem is, I still hadn't hit on an inspiration for how to remix it.  Oh well, I just decided to go ahead and make a straightforward Popover out of upcycled materials.  And I am so glad I did!

At some point between when that skirt photo was taken and this photo was taken, this fabric was ironed.  I swear.

I made a size 4 for my 3.5 year old daughter, but I cut out the size 6 length because she wants all of her dresses to be long.  And I used the original hem from the skirt so I kept all of that length--nothing folded under for a hem.  The size 4 was a little big on her, and while *I* would have liked the way it looked better at knee-length, she loves it this way. I thought it turned out pretty cool--the skirt was cut on the bias, so the dress is cut that way too, and I like the embroidery that only goes halfway around the back.

I had to reeeally squeeze to get enough fabric for the straps, but that worked out fine too.  And how could I possibly resist making a matching doll dress with that little pattern they included?  So stinking cute.

But, to make a long story even longer, the real reason I'm now writing this post is that in making the first dress, I found my inspiration for a remix!  I loved how nicely finished this pattern is on the inside--so much that I thought it would be a perfect pattern to make reversible.  My wheels started turning, and I remembered this post that I had seen on Alida Makes for a bubble sundress.  I love the look of bubble dresses, but most have some sort of strange inner workings to create the effect that I can't get my head around.  When I read Alida's tutorial, it seemed so simple!  So I adapted her idea slightly to make a reversible bubble version of the Popover sundress.

I am totally in love with the results!

When can I draw on the chalkboard?

Options

What's that you say?  Look at the camera?  But I'm drawing!

Oh, I guess I might as well show you the back:

Artsy

No piping on the back side--helped with reversibility.

A few tips on how I adapted the pattern:

-When cutting out my pattern, I mixed sizing a little.  My dress pattern was a size 3 width at the top, a size 4 length, but I angled out to a size 6 width at the bottom (so a little extra length for making the bubble, and some extra width for blousiness).  For reference, my daughter is 3.5 years old and a smidge on the small side, and I am thrilled with the way the fit came out.

-I cut two dress panels out of fabric A and two out of fabric B.  For the bodice panel, I still only cut two like in the original pattern.  I used premade bias tape for the straps and added piping under the bodice panels.

-When I started sewing, I referred to the Alida Makes bubble sundress tutorial for how to assemble my pieces.  I made some adaptations here too to make it more reversible--namely I cut a 29" piece of baby elastic to make my bubble (it was just under 3/4ths of the total width of the skirt) and sewed it right to the seam where I joined my two fabrics together (on the wrong side of the fabric where the seam allowances are pressed open)--instead of sewing with elastic thread on the lining panel.

-Then, when I sewed the tops of the two fabrics together, I first pinned the bodice panels into place so they would already be sewn in and nicely finished.  You could totally just sew across the tops of the two panels to join them, following the curves for the armholes and everything, and just finish the top of the sundress exactly as the Oliver + S pattern directions say though.  In retrospect, that probably would have been the way to go--I ended up with lots of finagling to do with the straps and seam-ripping tiny holes to insert them and whatnot.

-After turning the dress right-side out, I jumped back to the Oliver + S pattern to finish the top.  Like I said, I had already inserted my bodice panel, but that ended up being more of a pain than it was worth to have the finished armpits without bias tape--I would say to just follow the directions in the Popover pattern to finish the top, but with one caveat--make sure you use thread that will be disguised on your second fabric when attaching the bodice (rather than matching the bodice fabric).

This shows the back of the dress--see that tiny black seam about 1/2 inch below the red bodice? Yeah, I didn't think so :)

-To help both sides look equally finished, I used my zipper foot and added piping to what would be the front of each bodice.  I made the front of one fabric be the back of the other when reversed, so that there would always be the nice finished piping look on the front, and the subtle seam just under the join of the bodice to the rest of the dress on the back.

Piping pinned into place--one "front" is currently on the outside, the other "front" is on the inside.

I ended up opening up the seam just under the bodice enough to slip the bias tape inside, but I think it would have looked nicer to just have the bias tape all the way around the armpit.  I was distracted by how the reversible dress made for a nice finished armhole.

I can't wait to head over to this week's challenge page now that the link-up is open--check out my reversible bubble dress as well as loads of other fantastic takes on this sweet sundress on the Project Run & Play Season 7 Pattern Remix post!

For now this is just a few tips, but I could probably do a more cohesive tutorial on how to make this dress if there is any interest for that.  Let me know if you have any questions about the process or if you'd like me to do it a tutorial!

Tie-Dyed Tank Dress

Are you kidding me with this, Mom?  You are just now blogging the tie-dye dress we made together in JULY?

Ah, it's okay!  What do I care?  I don't read your blog anyway!

Catch ya later.

(Dress made from two kid-sized white cotton tees bought at Dollar Tree, some scraps of rib knit off an old t-shirt for the armhole binding, and some 1/4 inch elastic inside the waistband casing. Used the existing neckline of one tee and the existing hem of the other.  Made the dress without the armhole casings, tie-dyed it with help from Little Sister, who was very particular about colors and design, then after rinsing, washing, and drying added the armhole bindings.)

Upcycled Yoga Skirt

So, I'm not very athletic.  That may be a bit of an understatement.  But there are times when I feel like I should kind of look the part.  When I need a sporty costume.  I just don't have any athletic gear in my wardrobe!  I hardly own any shorts, period, let alone anything made out of something other than denim.  One such time is when I take the kids to the kids/parents yoga class.  Now, this class has parents in the title mainly because the instructor wants you to know you may not drop your kids off and run.  I move around a little, but I am not getting a workout here other than kid-wrangling, since I'm one of the few parents who bring not one but two little yogis to class.  But still, it would feel strange to show up in jeans.  In theory, I could be doing yoga.  I have some loose yoga pants that are really more like lounge pants, but my favorite thing to wear to class is a t-shirt dress over leggings.  However, one thing most of my knit dresses are missing is...you guessed it, pockets.

I do have a couple knit dresses with pockets (this one is my favorite) but the problem is that most knits are too thin to be able to USE the pockets without the garment looking really unflattering and lumpy, as well as weighing the garment down if you put something heavy in there like keys or your phone.  But I like having pockets for this yoga class (and a few of my other active-adjacent activities) so that I have somewhere to stick the little key to the bike lock, the rubber bands that keep the mats from unrolling, a hair clip for when Little Sister wants her hair from flopping in her eyes like I tried to tell her it would, etc.  So when I found this t-shirt at the Goodwill outlet, I knew it would work as a skirt.

Cost:  not sure what it weighs, but it was $1.59 per pound!

It's a much heavier weight knit than a typical t-shirt, and I loved the print (I also thought that the busy-ness of the print would keep the pockets more subtle).   And it looked like brand new!  

I had been meaning to make a skirt like this for a while, but it wasn't until I found this perfect top to upcycle that I was inspired to actually do it.  And, even though I made it so that I would have something to wear when I needed to be a little more sporty than usual, I have actually worn it without the leggings as just a plain old comfy skirt!  I decided to topstitch the pockets on, because then it's obvious that any lumps are coming from STUFF in your pocket.  Lumpy stuff in a hidden side-seam pocket looks more weird to me.

Here's how I made it:

1. Cut off the bottom of the shirt as close to the armpits as possible

2. Out of some coordinating leftover knit (possibly the bottom of another t-shirt) cut out your waistband fabric.  Mine was about 16 inches tall and wide enough to go around my waist when I stretched it really far.  You really want it to be snug--my knit that I used for the waistband was super stretchy, and I ended up adding a piece of elastic to the inside because it kept slipping down.

The size of my unfolded foldover waistband

3.  With the right sides together, sew your two 16" ends together, creating a loop that will fit very snugly around your waist.  Then fold that loop in half (right side out) so that the raw edges are lined up and the seam allowance is hidden inside.

4.  If you are adding pockets (a must for me!) cut them out of the remains of your skirt fabric.  The top I used had a square neckline, so I cut my pockets out using the finished edge of the neckline for the top of the pockets.  Then I turned the other edges under and topstitched the pockets to the body of the skirt so that the raw edges of the pocket would be sewn into the waistband. I actually cut the body of my skirt down the sides a little so that I could insert the side of the pocket into the side seam of the skirt as well, but you could just as easily topstitch them down all the way around.

Pocket view

5. Once your pockets are attached, slip your waistband over the top of your skirt so that the raw edges all line up.  Stretch the waistband and pin to the skirt, then sew all the way around using a wide zig-zag stitch.  If you'd like the top of the skirt to be a little more snug, you can also sew in a piece of elastic that's about 2" shorter than where you'd like the skirt to sit.  Add the elastic right where the waistband meets the top of the skirt.

6. Done!  Pull the waistband up, then you can fold it over how you like it!

Me in my "sporty costume."  Think I'm fooling anyone?

Bargain Hunting--thrift store style!

It's been a while since I've done a bargain hunting post--heck, it's been a while since I've done any kind of post at all!  But today was 1/2 price day at a local thrift store, and I did pretty well if I say so myself.  Wanna see what I got?

I'll start with the boy stuff, since that's what I was looking for.  As usual, not nearly as much selection in this department but not too bad.

First, Lands End shorts in great shape.  Size 7, so the boy can wear them next summer.  $2.50.

These Gymboree shorts will hopefully still fit next year, but they also fit now, which is nice since we probably have at least another month of nice weather. $2.

Gymboree cords, probably a little too baggy for my taste but I should be able to take in the legs a bit.  $2.50

And these Airwalks are The Boy's favorite color.  Still a size or two too big, so hopefully his favorite color won't change too much in the next couple of years!  $3.

These Keens should fit Little Sister next summer--or maybe the one after that.  For $2, I didn't really care!

My favorite were these two pairs of Gap skinny pants--pink jeans and orange cords, both size 3T.  Don't know if I can get her to wear them or not!  She mostly refuses to wear pants, but we haven't tried skinnies, so maybe they will be a bridge from leggings?  We'll see.  Each pair was $2, and they are in like-new condition.

Don't know why this pic makes it look worn on the front of the legs--they're totally not.

I can never remember what size my kids are in Hanna Andersson clothing, but I thought this was so cute and that it would fit someday!  It's also in like-new shape and was $1.50.

This is from Old Navy, but also in good shape.  It's a knit sweater with a fleecy warm lining.  Won't fit for a couple of years though!  $3.

These leggings are HUGE--size 8!  But they had no wear at all, and they are from Tea Collection, and they were $2!  Can't decide if I should hang onto them until Little Sister fits into them or just resell them at a consignment store--I mean, who knows what kids will be wearing 5 years into the future?  Moon suits?

Last but not least I grabbed this Dickies button-down for the Dad guy on my way out--it was just hanging there on the end of the rack, in his size, looking lonely, so I decided to bring it home.  $3.

I forgot to photograph my other find--a stack of 3 pads of 18x24 colored construction paper for $1! That brought my grand total total to $26.50--not bad!

Jersey Dress with Pockets

[Edited 9/28/13:  I am definitely cheating here, but there was no way I was going to complete a black dress for Project Sewn's Little Black Dress theme this week.  I already have two of them in my closet, and I rarely wear either, so it's just not something practical for me.  Plus, I am up to my elbows in sewing for the kids, and so I'm reposting this awesome dress that I love from two months ago, since the rules say you have to have sewn it in the last six months.  I just can't resist being involved!  AND, my book club just read Orange is the New Black by Piper Kerman, so it just kept going through my head.  Recommended, btw!  But I promise I will be sewing new things for the other themes.]

This dress was such a sewing win!  And I tell you, I needed one.  I feel like everything I touch lately turns into scrap fabric. This was low-pressure, since it was for myself (unlike the bridesmaid dress I was hemming and cut a hole in--maaaaaybe I'll tell you the story once I've figured out how to resolve it) and the fabric was picked up at a secondhand store for $4 for about 3 yards (unlike the leftover fabric from this dress that I attempted a tank out of, which totally doesn't fit in several weird ways).  I have also so far avoided getting any silly putty stuck in it.

But the happy ending is, this dress came together easily and quickly, it's super comfortable, and I LOVE it.  I want to wear it every day.  I will probably make another one. [When I do, I promise I will make it a tutorial!]

Full length

 This probably isn't a color I would have picked out at the fabric store, but I think it's great.  It's a nice soft orange, not too harsh.  I love contrast bindings, so rather than using more of the orange I found this gray jersey in my stash that I had just barely enough of to bind the neckline and armholes, and luckily enough for a raw strip around the hem too, since I cut the dress shorter than I meant to.

Back view

 I used the pattern I cut from a favorite t-shirt of mine for the top, which I recommend.  I have made several shirts from this pattern (see here, here, and here)--the original shirt and the ones that I have made have gathers in the shoulders, but I was feeling lazy so I just cut them straight across this time (curving down a bit actually to give a slight cap) rather than winging them up for the extra fabric to gather.  I skipped it for time, and because I wanted to do a simple armhole binding and not worry about hiding the gathered edges inside, but I actually like the simpler cap sleeve a lot.  I had marked my natural waist on my pattern, so instead of cutting the shirt full-length, I just cut it off about 5 inches below that natural waist point.

Photobombed by Snow White.  Who is usually nowhere to be found when I actually WANT a picture of her.

 For the skirt, I used my trusty Milkmaid Skirt pattern, which I've also made several times.  It's such a great free tutorial from Crafterhours, and I thought there was no reason it wouldn't make just as good of a skirt for a dress.  I was right!  I cut out the pattern for the front and back of the skirt from the orange jersey, and made the pockets from the gray jersey.  I didn't cut out the waistband piece, since I'd be attaching it directly to my top.   And I waited to hem it until I could see the length of the dress as a whole.

From the side

Once I had finished the top and the skirt, I turned the skirt inside out (pinning the pockets shut so that they wouldn't shift around on me--you could also just stitch across the top of them to hold them in place).  The top of the skirt is much wider than the bottom of the shirt--on purpose. I pinned the side seams to eachother and stretched the top to fit with the bottom, pinning all the way around, then sewed them together.  This is the part where I wish I hadn't been so impatient to get it done, because I didn't take any pictures--wasn't really planning on a tutorial--but now that I've decided to explain it to you I'm really wishing there were pics to help.

So, what I did was turn the dress inside out.  To make a casing for the elastic, the raw edges from joining the top and skirt should be folded up toward the top, then fold up again so that the raw edges are hidden inside the casing.  Make sure to stretch the fabric gently as you go so that you don't get puckers in the front of your dress, and sew all the way around the top of the casing.  Then flip the dress right-side out again, and "stitch in the ditch" (sew on top of your other seam) where the top and bottom are joined together to hold the casing in place.  Make sure to leave an opening for your elastic.

Then run your elastic through the casing.  I used 1/4 inch.  Before sewing my elastic together and closing the opening in the casing, I tried the dress on to make sure the elastic was as tight as I wanted it.

I would save hemming for last--that way you know how short your dress will be once you blouse the top out a little.  I was planning to leave the hem raw, but since it was on the short side I added a second raw strip of the gray jersey, and I really like the added detail as well as the length!

[Also an edit--shortly after I posted this, Cate Blanchett wore this dress to an event.  Coincidence, or she saw my blog post and called her stylist?]

Pattern Hack: based on the Go To Dress

As I was organizing my patterns a few weeks ago, I was excited to come across one I had printed out ages ago and had yet to make.  It was the Go To Dress from Train to Crazy, and I had some more of this purple jersey sheet that I had been wanting to make a dress out of for Little Sister, particularly because I had a ribbed tank to cut up and use for some cute binding.

Yes, she is holding a waffle.

So I got my pattern all cut out and taped together for a size 3, and I went to the site to find the directions.  Except...the pattern that was a freebie when I printed it out is now only available for purchase (it's a super cute dress)--so the tutorial is no longer on the website!

Pattern available from The Train to Crazy

I guess what a sane person would do is just purchase the pattern so that they knew how to use the pattern they had, but I am clearly not that person.   [Edited to add--I was going to put a link here to the site where you can purchase the pattern, for those of you who are more sane than I, but...I couldn't find it!  If I can track down where to buy the pattern I'll add the link here, or please let me know if you know where to get it!]

Since I was planning on making some adaptations anyway, I just went for it.  As you can see from the differences in the pictures, I pretty much only used the pattern for the main body of the dress--I incorporated the gathers in front and in the back, but left out the sleeves (both the long ones and the cap sleeves).  I had been planning to just do the cap sleeves, but without instructions I thought I'd better just keep it simple.

cute printed binding cut from a ribbed cotton tank

I used this method for binding the neckline, and just this simple method (she uses it for the neckline, but you can see how to do it) for the armholes.  I used my double needle to hem the bottom, and I was planning on doing an elastic waist, but when I tried it on the girl to see where to put the waistband, she declared that she liked it just as it was, and that she wanted to wear it right then.

Which should have been great, right?  I mean, she loves it!  She wants to wear it!  Except...

Before we even got out of the house, she managed to grind a wad of silly putty firmly into the backside.

Well, that doesn't look so bad, you might say...

Nope, it's pretty bad.

I thought I might just have to cut the bottom off, add a wide band of that printed ribbing, and turn it into a super cute tank top.  Honestly, that probably should have been the way to go (less time and effort, for sure), but Little Sister was SO SAD that I would turn her long long dress into a shirt that I decided to take a crack at Silly Putty removal.

According to Crayola's website (the makers of Silly Putty), you scrape off as much putty as possible with a blunt knife, then soak the area with WD-40 (which I had to purchase, making stain removal the most expensive part of this garment) and let it sit for about 5 minutes.  Then scrape again, respray with WD-40, and wipe stain off with cotton balls.  Summarized, but you get the idea.

Well.  It went fine until the "wipe stain off with cotton balls" part.  Not sure what I was supposed to be wiping off.  The putty was pretty much gone at this point, so was I supposed to wipe off the WD-40?  Hmm.  The wiping with a cotton ball did exactly nothing.

They go on to say that if any stain remains, soak a cotton ball with rubbing alcohol, blot the stain and rinse, then wipe remaining residue away with a dishcloth with a few drops of dish soap.  I guess they must have meant that if there was any PUTTY remaining, but I was more concerned with the WD-40 stain all over the back of the dress, and I had heard that dish soap (specifically Dawn) was good for removing that kind of thing, so I thought maybe they were referring to the WD-40 stain after all.  So I did the cotton ball with rubbing alcohol thing, then rubbed again with a sponge with Dawn on it, and threw it in the wash.

Good thing I checked before tossing it in the dryer, because...drum roll...giant WD-40 grease stains all over the back of the dress.  They even seemed to have spread out a bit.

But the happy ending is that I soaked all the grease stains with my Oxy-Clean Max Force Gel stain removal stick, and it all came out just fine.

Not sponsored or anything--it's just what was in my laundry room and it worked.

I tried to get a photo of the revived back of the dress while she was wearing it today...

You might have to take my word for it that the stains are gone--this is the best I could do.

But she just didn't want to take a break from her Jedi training with her big brother to let me get a photo.

I can't say I blame her.

It looked pretty fun.

"You know, I think you'll be a pretty good Jedi."